The Design and Experimental Development of Air Scanning Using a Sniffer Quadcopter.

Endrowednes Kuantama,Radu Tarca,Ioan Dzitac,Tiberiu Vesselenyi,Simona Dzitac,Ioan Tarca

doi:10.3390/s19183849

Abstract

This study presents a detailed analysis of an air monitoring development system using quadcopters. The data collecting method is based on gas dispersion investigation to pinpoint the gas source location and determine the gas concentration level. Due to its flexibility and low cost, a quadcopter was integrated with air monitoring sensors to collect the required data. The analysis started with the sensor placement on the quadcopter and their correlation with the generated vortex. The reliability and response time of the sensor used determine the duration of the data collection process. The dynamic nature of the environment makes the technique of air monitoring of topmost concern. The pattern method has been adapted to the data collection process in which area scanning was marked using a point of interest or grid point. The experiments were done by manipulating a carbon monoxide (CO) source, with data readings being made in two ways: point source with eight sampling points arranged in a square pattern, and non-point source with 24 sampling points in a grid pattern. The quadcopter collected data while in a hover state with 10 s sampling times at each point. The analysis of variance method (ANOVA) was also used as the statistical algorithm to analyze the vector of gas dispersion. In order to tackle the uncertainty of wind, a bivariate Gaussian kernel analysis was used to get an estimation of the gas source area. The result showed that the grid pattern measurement was useful in obtaining more accurate data of the gas source location and the gas concentration. The vortex field generated by the propeller was used to speed up the accumulation of the gas particles to the sensor. The dynamic nature of the wind caused the gas flow vector to change constantly. Thus, more sampling points were preferred, to improve the accuracy of the gas source location prediction.

Highlights

IntroductionWater, and soil pollutants are impossible to avoid, being encountered in almost all countries
Several types of air, water, and soil pollutants are impossible to avoid, being encountered in almost all countries
The authors state that it is estimated that these fires generate as much as 3% of the world’s annual carbon dioxide emissions and that drone collected gas concentration data provides a safe alternative for evaluating the rank of burning coal deposits

Summary

Introduction

Water, and soil pollutants are impossible to avoid, being encountered in almost all countries. Some of them represent real threats, rising risks to human health and environment degradation, such as (for the case of big cities) air pollution generated by stationary sources (e.g., factories, power plants), by mobile sources (e.g., cars, buses), and natural sources Pollutants can be classified into two types: pollutants having known sources, and pollutants having unknown sources. Most developed countries have developed law regulations to organize regular air quality supervision for primary urban pollutants [1,2,3]. The regulations could be put into practice only by monitoring regularly and accurately the concentration of the pollutant

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